The first question a foreign group asks about a Turkish contract is whether the price can be in euros or dollars, and the answer has been a list, not a rule, since September 2018. Decree No. 32 on the Protection of the Value of Turkish Currency prohibits residents of Turkey from agreeing prices and other payment obligations in foreign currency or indexed to it in the contracts the Ministry designates, and Article 8 of the Ministry's Communiqué designates them: real estate sales and leases, employment contracts and most service contracts are prohibited, movable sales and leases, works contracts with foreign currency costs, foreign software and hardware licences and a dozen other categories are permitted, and a company in Turkey that is fifty per cent or more foreign-owned enjoys an exception for the employment and service contracts it signs as employer or customer. The list has been amended a dozen times, the paragraph numbers have moved, and the rule that movable sales had to be paid in lira was added in 2022 and removed in 2025. I set out the current position from the texts, the way a foreign currency debt is paid and bears interest under the Code of Obligations and the interest law, and the drafting that keeps a contract on the right side of the line.
Sources, checked 11 September 2026. Decree No. 32 on the Protection of the Value of Turkish Currency, Article 4(g), as inserted by Presidential Decision No. 85 (Official Gazette 30534, 13 September 2018); Communiqué No. 2008-32/34, Article 8, as rewritten by Communiqué 2018-32/52 (Official Gazette 30597, 16 November 2018) and amended by Communiqués 2021-32/59, 2022-32/66, 2024-32/69, 2024-32/70, 2025-32/71 and 2025-32/72, with the Official Gazette index checked for 2026 amendments through 11 September 2026; Turkish Code of Obligations No. 6098, Articles 27 and 99; Law No. 3095, Article 4/a; Law No. 1567, Article 3; Turkish Commercial Code No. 6102, Article 1530.
The rule: Article 4(g) of Decree No. 32
Presidential Decision No. 85 of 12 September 2018 inserted into Article 4 of Decree No. 32 a paragraph (g) under which persons resident in Turkey may not agree, in the contracts the Ministry of Treasury and Finance designates, a contract price or other payment obligation in foreign currency or indexed to foreign currency, except in the cases the Ministry designates. The prohibition therefore has two moving parts, the designated contracts and the designated exceptions, and both live in Article 8 of Communiqué 2008-32/34, which the Ministry rewrote in full on 16 November 2018 and has amended since. Article 3 of Law No. 1567 on the Protection of the Value of Turkish Currency provides the sanction: an administrative fine for breach of the regulatory acts made under it, in amounts revalued annually. The civil consequence follows from Article 27 of the Code of Obligations: a currency clause contrary to a mandatory rule is void, and the contract stands with the price to be redetermined in lira, which is what the Communiqué's transitional paragraphs required for contracts already in force in 2018.
Who is a resident
The prohibition applies only between persons resident in Turkey. Article 8 adds two rules that decide most group structures. Under paragraph 19, the Turkish branches, representative offices, offices and liaison offices of non-residents, companies in which non-residents directly or indirectly hold fifty per cent or more of the shares or joint control or control, and companies in free zones within their free zone activities, may agree foreign currency or indexed prices in the employment contracts and service contracts to which they are party as employer or as recipient of the service. Under the paragraph on foreign establishments of residents, numbered 23 in the 2018 text and 24 after the 2024 renumbering, the branches, offices, funds and fifty per cent subsidiaries abroad of Turkish residents are treated as residents for Article 4(g) unless the contract is performed abroad. A Turkish subsidiary that is majority foreign-owned may therefore pay its Turkish employees and its Turkish service providers in euros, but it may not buy or lease Turkish real estate in euros, and it may not sell its services in euros to another Turkish resident that does not itself fall under an exception.
| Contract between Turkish residents | Foreign currency or indexed price | Paragraph of Article 8 |
|---|---|---|
| Sale of real estate in Turkey | Prohibited, except where the buyer is a non-citizen resident or a paragraph 19 person | 1, 3 |
| Lease of real estate in Turkey | Prohibited, except non-citizen or paragraph 19 tenants, licensed accommodation facilities and duty-free shops | 2, 3, 4, 5 |
| Employment contracts | Prohibited, except performance abroad, seafarers, non-citizen employees and paragraph 19 employers | 6, 14, 19 |
| Service contracts, including consultancy, brokerage and transport | Prohibited, except non-citizen parties, export and foreign currency earning services, activities abroad, cross-border services, accommodation in licensed facilities and paragraph 19 recipients | 7, 19 |
| Works contracts with foreign currency costs | Permitted | 8 |
| Sale of movables other than vehicles | Permitted; the 2022 lira payment requirement was removed in March 2025 | 9 |
| Lease of movables other than vehicles | Permitted | 10 |
| Foreign-produced software sales and foreign hardware and software licences and services | Permitted | 11 |
| Ship leasing and leasing under Articles 17 and 17/A of the Decree | Permitted | 12, 13 |
| Contracts of public bodies, defence foundation companies and EYDEP A and B certified companies, other than real estate | Permitted | 15 |
| Capital market instruments and aviation undertakings | Permitted | 18, 20 |
| Indexation to precious metals or commodities priced in foreign currency | Treated as indexation to foreign currency; fuel indexation allowed in transport services | 22 in the 2018 text, 23 after 2024 |
The prohibited categories
Paragraphs 1 and 2 prohibit foreign currency and indexed prices and payment obligations in contracts for the sale and lease of real estate located in Turkey, including housing and roofed workplaces; paragraph 3 lifts the prohibition where a resident without Turkish citizenship or a paragraph 19 person is the buyer or the tenant, paragraph 4 for leases of accommodation facilities certified by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism for the purpose of operating them, and paragraph 5 for leases of duty-free shops. Paragraph 6 prohibits foreign currency in employment contracts other than those performed abroad and those of seafarers, and paragraph 14 lifts it for employees without Turkish citizenship. Paragraph 7 prohibits foreign currency in service contracts, including consultancy, brokerage and transport, with four statutory exceptions: contracts to which a person without Turkish citizenship is party; contracts within exports, transit trade, sales and deliveries deemed exports and foreign currency earning services and activities; contracts within activities that residents carry out abroad; and contracts that start in Turkey and end abroad, start abroad and end in Turkey, or start and end abroad; Communiqué 2021-32/59 added a fifth, accommodation service contracts in certified accommodation facilities. The prohibition on service contracts is the one that catches groups: a management fee, a shared services charge or a consultancy retainer between two Turkish subsidiaries is a service contract between residents, and it may be in euros only if the paying subsidiary is a paragraph 19 company or one of the four exceptions applies.
The permitted categories and the movable sales saga
Paragraph 8 permits foreign currency in works contracts that include foreign currency costs. Paragraph 9 permits it in contracts for the sale of movables other than vehicles, and this paragraph has the most history: Communiqué 2022-32/66 of 19 April 2022 added a sentence requiring the payment obligations under such contracts to be performed and accepted in lira, Communiqué 2024-32/69 of 28 February 2024 carved out negotiable instruments and invoices predating April 2022, precious metals and stones traded on the Istanbul exchange, sales through foreign trade capital and sectoral foreign trade companies and export consortia, goods under transit, warehousing, temporary storage and free zone regimes, and free zone firms' foreign trade sales, and Communiqué 2025-32/72 of 6 March 2025 rewrote the paragraph without the sentence, so that a movable sale between residents may today be agreed and paid in foreign currency. Paragraph 10 permits foreign currency in leases of movables other than vehicles, paragraph 11 in sales of software produced abroad and in licence and service contracts for hardware and software produced abroad, paragraphs 12 and 13 in leasing of ships and leasing under Articles 17 and 17/A of the Decree, paragraph 15 in contracts of public bodies and defence foundation companies other than real estate sales and leases, extended by Communiqué 2025-32/71 to companies holding an A or B level certificate under the industrial competence programme, paragraphs 16 and 17 in the contract chains under public foreign currency tenders and treaties and in public debt management transactions, paragraph 18 in capital market instruments, paragraph 20 in the contracts of airlines, aircraft maintenance companies and ground handling undertakings other than real estate and employment contracts, and the paragraph inserted by Communiqué 2024-32/70 in the contracts of notified bodies under the medical device regulations. The paragraph on indexation provides that contracts indexed to precious metals or commodities priced in foreign currency on international markets, or indirectly indexed to foreign currency, count as indexed contracts, except that transport service contracts may be indexed to fuel prices; and the paragraph on negotiable instruments provides that bills and cheques issued under contracts that may not be priced in foreign currency may not be denominated in it.
Paying and charging interest on a foreign currency debt
Where a foreign currency price is allowed, Article 99 of the Code of Obligations governs the payment. A money debt is paid in Turkish currency; where payment in another currency was agreed and the contract does not require payment in kind, the debtor may also pay in lira at the rate on the day of payment; and where the debt is not paid on the due date and the contract does not require payment in kind, the creditor may demand payment in the foreign currency itself or in lira at the rate of the due date or of the day of actual payment, at its choice. A contract that wants euros, not their lira equivalent, must therefore say "aynen" or words to that effect. Interest on a foreign currency debt in default is governed by Article 4/a of Law No. 3095: unless the contract sets a higher contractual or default rate, the highest interest that state banks pay on a one-year deposit in that currency applies, which is far below the lira rates set out on the late payment page, and in supplies between businesses Article 1530 of the Commercial Code governs the default itself. The penalty rules, and the merchant rule that bars a company from having a penalty reduced, are on the penalty clauses page.
Drafting
Identify the residence of both parties and, for the foreign-owned side, whether paragraph 19 applies, and record the shareholding on which it rests. Classify the contract by its object, not its title: a "framework agreement" that supplies services is a service contract under paragraph 7, and a "licence" of Turkish-developed software is not within paragraph 11. Where the contract is permitted in foreign currency, decide whether payment must be in kind under Article 99 and say so, fix the conversion rate and date for any lira payment, and set the default interest rate expressly, since Article 4/a otherwise applies the deposit rate. Where it is prohibited, price in lira and use a lawful adjustment mechanism, such as an index that is not a foreign currency or a commodity priced in one, remembering that the indexation paragraph treats indirect indexation as foreign currency indexation. In mixed contracts, split the foreign currency element into the permitted category, such as a works element with foreign currency costs, and price the rest in lira. And check the Communiqué on the day of signature, because Article 8 is amended by communiqué without notice and the Official Gazette index is the only reliable record; the structures a foreign group contracts through, and the paragraph 19 status they carry, are on the liaison office, branch and subsidiary page and the outsourced legal counsel page.
When the clause is challenged
A currency clause is challenged in three settings: by the debtor who wants to pay in lira at a historic rate, by the tax or customs authorities in an audit, and by the Ministry in a fine under Law No. 1567. In the first, the questions are residence, the category of the contract and the exceptions, and whether the contract required payment in kind under Article 99. In the second and third, the contract and the invoices are read against the paragraph in force on the date of signature. A contract that was lawful when signed remains lawful; a contract signed under an exception that was later narrowed is protected by the transitional rules in the amending communiqué, which is why the date of signature and the text in force on that date belong in the file. The acquisition of assets and shares in foreign currency between residents follows the same rules, on the asset and share deals page.
Whose side we are on, and how we are paid
The group's finance team priced the intercompany service agreement in euros because the parent invoices in euros. The landlord's agent said everybody signs office leases in dollars. The supplier's lawyer added a gold index to get around the rule. None of them is paid to tell you, before the signature, that a service contract between two Turkish residents is prohibited in euros unless the customer is majority foreign-owned, that an office lease in dollars is void as to the currency, or that a gold index is foreign currency indexation by the Communiqué's own words.
We take no commission or referral fee from banks, landlords, agents or counterparties, in any form, on any file. The fee you pay us is our only income from your matter, and it does not depend on which currency you sign in. Because our position does not move with the outcome, telling a subsidiary that its euro contract is unlawful, or a landlord that its dollar lease will be repriced in lira, costs us nothing to say.
One boundary, stated plainly. We are lawyers, not licensed investment advisers and not currency advisers. We do not forecast exchange rates or advise on hedging. What we protect is the Turkish legal position: a contract in a currency the Decree allows, a payment clause that says whether euros or their equivalent are due, an interest clause that does not default to the deposit rate, and a file that shows which text was in force when you signed.
Before the next contract is priced
Send us the draft, the shareholding of the Turkish parties and the description of what the contract actually supplies. We will tell you whether the price may be in foreign currency under the Communiqué as it stands on the day, what the payment and interest clauses should say, and how to structure a mixed contract lawfully. Our corporate work is described on the corporate law page.
What this page does not settle
Capital movements, loans from abroad and their use through banks, export and import payment rules, foreign currency accounts and the banks' documentation duties, tax treatment of exchange differences, hedging and derivatives, the free zone regime beyond paragraph 19, and the conduct of litigation and administrative proceedings are separate subjects. The paragraph numbers of Article 8 have shifted with amendments and should be read against the text in force on the date in question.
